“I never cared about the ‘0’ on my record and stuff like that,” sighs Regis Prograis.

“I never really cared. I mean, I want to be a world champion, definitely, did it twice and I want to be a world champion again. But for me, I want to be excited. People like the excitement more than they care about the ‘0’ and stuff, I think.”

Prograis, from New Orleans but who trains out of Las Vegas, is the IBF’s No 12, and Richardson Hitchins has that belt.

Prograis, of course, is no stranger to wars. His 2019 battle with Josh Taylor was one of the best of that year, too, and asked about recent comments regarding ‘Tom and Jerry boxing’, Prograis smiles: “I’m nowhere close to that. You know, Turki [Alalshikh], he’ll see I go in there and I fight. I think we’re moving past the era, the Floyd Mayweather era, where it was [all about being] undefeated. You know, he was undefeated. He kept the ‘0’ and he kept the ‘0’ no matter what happens; he’ll keep that if he makes it boring. But I think that we’re kind of past that right now. I think people want to have exciting fights. I mean, you don’t want to take it [the physical strain of a hard fight]. You don’t want to go out there and take crazy damage and stuff. But at the same time, it is boxing. You’re going to get hit and I think that people want us to have exciting fights. It gets the people talking.”

Prograis has seen plenty of changes in his 13-year career and he is not even close to thinking about retirement or focusing on what is next.

He is also one of the sport’s straight talkers. 

Asked how boxing is doing today, Prograis said: “I think boxing is going to be the same as it has always been. It always goes down and up and down and up, just like the stock market. “That’s how boxing is, man. I think it just goes by the fights. I think even a fight like with me and Jojo, that’s a good thing for boxing. I think that sometimes boxing gets a bad rap from other people. Sometimes I get online and I creep and watch the comments and a lot of people think boxing is rigged just because of scorecards and all those types of things. But a lot of people just don't realize, man, like watching the fight live and watching on TV. It's a total difference. It’s a big, big, big difference from watching things live and on TV. So I think that, let’s say we’re in an alright state. I’m not gonna say it’s the best state right now, but I think we’re in an okay state right now. Like I said, we’re getting out of a certain era. Most boxing fans want to see the skill and things like that. But you talk about the people that the real people that pay their money, they want to see knockouts. They want to see blood. They want to see action. And I think that we’re kind of leaving that era where we didn’t have the action and we’re into an era where there’s going to be more action. I think it’ll be rewarded more to see things like that.”